Mark Twain's memoir "Life on the Mississippi" recounts his early days working as a riverboat pilot on the Mississippi River. He describes the challenges of learning to navigate the ever-changing river. Twain grew up in Missouri and had an intimate knowledge of the Mississippi from his work as a riverboat pilot. The memoir provides colorful details about life and work on the river during the 19th century.

1. Mark Twain:
Life on the Mississippi

2. Journal
• In your notebooks, answer this prompt with
at least ½ page:
• Is ignorance bliss? Are you happier when you
don’t know the truth? Would you rather know
the truth and be upset or know a lie and be
happy?

3. Mark Twain
• Incredibly famous and influential
• Frequently quoted because of his intelligent and
funny outlook on life
– Ex. “To succeed in life, you need two things: ignorance
and confidence.”
• Real name is Samuel Clemens
• Grew up in Missouri & worked as a riverboat pilot
• Writes primarily about life on the Mississippi River
and the frontier
• Local color writer (uses lots of dialect)

5. Terms to Know
• Voice: a writer’s unique use of language that
allows a reader to “hear” a human personality
in his or her writing
• Diction: a writer’s choice of words
• Tone: a writer’s attitude toward his or her
subject
• Paraphrasing: writing information from
another source in your own words

6. Activity
1. Your graphic organizer has 10 words from
today’s story. You will walk around the room
and record each word’s definition in the
definition box.
2. Afterwards, you will find the word in the
story, and write down the sentence it comes
from in the box labeled “sentence from
story.”
3. After we go over the words, you will write an
example sentence with each word in the
“write your own” box.

7. Life on the Mississippi
• Excerpt from Twain’s memoir
• Tells the story of his first days at his new job as
a riverboat pilot
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3bOWyT
BbQA

10. Read
• Read “Life on the Mississippi” on page 674
• While we read, we are going to complete a
summarizing/drawing activity.
1. In one box, you are going to draw a picture of
something that happened in that section.
2. In the box beside, you are going to write a
summary of that section in your own words.
3. In the small box, you are going to write at three
words from that section that you did not know or
that grabbed your attention.

11. After Reading
• Complete the paraphrasing worksheet
• If you finish the worksheet, answer questions
6 and 7 on page 682